Tahu's Babysitting Experience
by Shade Salogel
Summary: When Tahu is asked to babysit for a friend, he has the adventure of a lifetime! Humor. AU


A/N-This story is AU. Takua is a matoran -Takanuva is the Toa from the movie, and is visiting this universe. This is part of a series of ongoing stories/games. Please, review! The authors thrive on reviews!

Disclaimer-We don't own Bionicles-the ideas are ours, however.

Takanuva had just arrived in this new universe, and was following the Matoran he had just met-Takua, and Takua's wife Klandra. Takua went to a large, two-story house, which was still standing, thankfully. The front door was wide open, with a small river of water flowing down the front steps. Through the open door, Takua thought he saw something large and metal, shining in the light coming from Takanuva. Toa Tahu, chasing four or five of Takua's children, was running in circles around the house, yelling.

Takua took a deep breath, and then shouted at the top of his lungs, "KIDS!" Instantly, everyone except Tahu froze. The only sound was Tahu slowing, and Elem falling to the ground because he didn't dare move out of his mid-run position to balance.

"Alright, front and center! Line up, age order!"

Several children jumped out of the second-story windows. "I told you not to do that," Takua grumbled. "Use the stairs." Another child ran from behind the front door, and the rest came scurrying in from the yard. A line of eight children quickly formed in front of their father and mother.

"Toa Tahu," Takua called, and Tahu stormed over, little puffs of smoke rising from his tightly clenched sword.

"What?" The Toa demanded, roughly. The children nearest him shifted nervously.

"Could you please . . . uh . . . tell me . . ." Takua trailed off, deciding to just get the information from his children instead. "Never mind, Toa. Thanks for keeping them occupied." A few stifled sniggers were heard in the vicinity of the kids, and Tahu shot a glare in their direction. Then the fire Toa walked off, and disappeared behind a building.

Takua turned back to the line. "Bruntin," He said, looking at his oldest, who was of earth, and was about the equivalent of the age ten. "Tell me why Toa Tahu is so angry."

"Well," Bruntin replied, looking down at his black toes. "Maybe it's because of the stake we tied him to." He shook his head sadly. "He didn't like that."

"You tied him to-" Takua a stopped, and sighed. Abruptly he turned to Bruntin's twin Duny, who was of fire. "Duny, why did you tie Toa Tahu to a stake?"

"So he wouldn't chase us." The boy answered, looking at his father as if he couldn't believe his father had asked such a stupid question.

"Elem, start from the beginning." Takua ordered, starting to loose patience.

"Well, first I was born, and then-"

"You know what I mean, Elem."

"Depends on what you call the beginning, but maybe Toa Tahu was angry because of the water we dumped on him."

Takua raised his eyebrows. "I see. That would explain the river coming down the front steps. What did you use to dump that much water?"

"The tub." Elem replied slowly, gazing at the white clouds in the sky. "The big tub."

"My big silver tub?" Klandra broke in. "Is it in one piece?"

"Not exactly. The ropes didn't hold and the tub fell with the water spilling out."

Klandra sighed. "That means no more baths." She said sadly, but before the children could cheer, she declared, "Showers instead!"

Interrupting the groans of his offspring, Takua asked eight-year-old Zsorone who was a Le, "What happened after the tub?"

Zsorone, however, had just caught sight of Takanuva, who was watching from a little ways away. The young Matoran ran up to the Toa, and hugged him around the knees, nearly knocking Takanuva over. "Wow! It's a biiiig gold guy! And he's got a biiiig stick! And he's so biiiig and-"

"Zsorone! Get back in line!" When Takua's green masked son did not obey, Takua dragged him away from the others, disappearing into the house. A minute later, they reappeared, and Zsorone went back to his spot, answering his father's questions quickly.

"The tub falling made Toa Tahu go to sleep. You should have heard him-he yelled realllllly loud when the tub fell! And it was soooo hard to get it off him. We tied him to the stake while he was sleeping-he snores reealllly loud! When he woke up, he just burned up allll the ropes!"

Takua nodded and shifted his gazed to his seven-year-old daughter. Before he could question her, she blurted out her bit of the story. "Zsorone forgot something. We played ring around the rosie after we tied the Toa to the stake."

"Ring around the rosie, Kara?"

"More like ring around Tahu, I guess." She corrected, with a decisive nod.

"What happened after that?" Takua queried, glancing around to find the stake. There- a old dead, limbless tree, newly scorched black. He had been meaning to cut it down. And by the huge pile of burnt ropes, Tahu had been barely visible through the ropes.

"He chased us, but we got away, 'cause we know where the tripwires are-were. He kinda burned them." Kara told him sincerely.

"Tripwires!" Takua exclaimed. "Oh, Mata Nui!" (_THUD!) _He turned to face Tarkinn, his five-year-old of fire. The Matoran sighed again. The last time Tahu had babysat for them, Tarkinn had practically waged war with Tahu, the neighbors had gone into hiding, and the oven was never quite the same.

"Tarkinn," he said slowly, "Did you happen to light any fires?" he reached over and pulled a match from his son's mouth.

"Three," replied Tarkinn with an enthusiastic grin. "In the furnace room, under the jungle gym, and in the woods." Takua nearly panicked and rushed off to put them out. "Stay there, I'll be right back!" he called over his shoulder.

Thankfully, around the wooden jungle gym was sand, and the one in the woods had been built in a circle of stones, but it was the furnace room that really concerned him.

_Rahi! I forgot to lock the door again! _Takua thought, upset with himself as he turned the handle. Inside the dimly lit room, on the dirt floor a tiny flame had burned itself out. The Ta-Matoran sighed with relief, set the gasoline can on a high shelf, locked the door, and hurried back to his children.

"You and I will have a talk later," he growled at his pyromaniac son, then calmed himself and asked his icy four-year-old daughter, "Lila, did you throw any snowballs?"

The white-masked girl nodded. "From my secret freezer." She said, her blue eyes wide. "In the neighbor's house." Takua groaned inwardly, but continued. "When did you throw them?"

"After the tub," she answered innocently.

"How many?"

Lila pondered this for a long moment. "I lost count 'cause I throwed them with my snow launcher."

"At least twenty. They knocked him over." Elem supplied helpfully.

"Then he chase me, but Zsorone distracted him." Lila added. Zsorone rubbed his arm.

Takua was about to talk to everyone, but two-year-old Treia called him, and told him in nonsense words her point of view on the story. She wasn't about to be left out. Takua listened carefully to her babble, smiling a little. When she finished, she looked up at him expectantly.

"Thank you, Treia." He praised her, and she beamed up at him, clapping her hands in delight.

"She was telling you about leading Tahu into the living room." Lila interpreted. "That was the first thing that happened."

"Now," Takua announced, looking at the children. "No interrupting. I'll tell the whole story back to you, and when I'm finished, you tell me if everything's right." Eight heads nodded, so Takua began.

When Tahu walked in the door, he saw no one. Takua and Klandra had eight kids, so they had to be somewhere around here. He walked into the kitchen and saw a toddler Ga-Matoran. Giggling happily, she came up to him, and started tugging on his hand, babbling nonsense the whole time.

"What? What is it?" Tahu asked, confused. She seemed to be leading him back into the living room. Once there, she pointed sternly at him.

"'Ate." The small Matoran ordered, and then scampered off. Tahu stared after her, and heard a creak and a snap from above, where there was a balcony. Looking up, he yelled in alarm as a huge silver tub, accompanied by gallons of water, fell on him.

The first thing Tahu realized as he woke up and looked around blearily was that there was a large contraption blocking an open doorway to his left. Holding a hand to his head, he stumbled towards it. He noticed a small Ko-Matoran loading something white into a round hole on the side of the machine.

"Ready!" The girl announced, with no change in the expression of her mask. Then, perhaps two dozen snowballs hit Tahu's chest, hard enough to sting. However, because he wasn't expecting anything and was still woozy, he lost his balance and landed sitting on the floor.

Angry now, and wide awake, he yelled and ran toward the young Ko-matoran. She panicked and sprinted down the hall. Vaulting over the snow launcher, the Toa was going too fast to stop when a Le-Matoran darted in front of him. They collided, and Lila got away as Tahu fell into unconsciousness again.

The next thing Tahu knew, he was standing upright, tied to a dead tree, literally in a cocoon of ropes. He tried to wiggle his fingers, but found that each finger had been individually tied to the other fingers with string. That did it. Flame completely engulfed Tahu for a few seconds, and he stepped away from the tree. Now that he could see, he found that the children had been running in a circle around him, singing a silly chant.

Tahu was really quite angry by this point, and the eight kids had enough sense to realize this fact. They ran.

Wherever Tahu chased them-through the house, through the yard, or through the small area of trees, tripwires were laid. After finding each one, he would get up and make certain that the wire wouldn't trip him again. Tahu was panting by then, but refused to give up. Just then, Takua and Klandra got home.


End file.
